If you go here....you can read yesterday's Supreme Court ruling, in effect, restoring habeas corpus rights. The case, Boumediene v. Bush, was decided by a 5-4 margin, with Justice Kennedy writing the decision for the majority. Justice Roberts and Justice Scalia each wrote dissents.

Of course, the very idea of denying prisoners....any prisoners....habeas corpus rights is unAmerican. In America we have always believed that every person has the right to their day in court. Anyone detained or arrested has a basic right to know what he is being charged with and what alleged crimes he has committed. Anything falling short or denying this basic right is nothing but totalitarianism.

In America, at least until Bush, we've been a nation which has historically followed due process and upheld law and order. It is the Bush administration who radically rejected centuries old habeas corpus rights and went on to set up American gulags....the type the Soviets used to try to hide....where legal rights were entirely jettisoned. This new and radical departure from American legal tradition is better understood in light of the radical torture, pre-emptive war, and secret rendition doctrines also implemented during the Bush/Cheney regime. A regime,.....so extreme in nature, so unilateral in it's thinking, so lawless....that it's members purposely and extensively propagandized the Congress and the American people, disinforming both about a threat that didn't exist from a nation which had no dangerous weapons.

Yesterday's Supreme Court ruling must be understood within the context of what's turned out to be the most criminal American executive branch in our history. A presidency which claims unConstitutional, kingly, "unitary executive" powers. A president who states that if America is at war.....any war or any form of war.....he is not to be constrained by ANY laws while "protecting" the nation. The country rejected the notion of a king over two hundred years ago. The Supreme Court rejected the notion again yesterday.

Justice Kennedy summed up this way:

"The laws and Constitution are designed to survive, and remain in force, in extraordinary times. Liberty and security can be reconciled; and in our system they are reconciled within the framework of the law." "Link

Yesterday's ruling is not some anomaly....

" The justices, in a 5-4 ruling Thursday (.pdf), handed the Bush administration its
third setback at the high court since 2004 over its treatment of prisoners who are being held indefinitely and without charges at the U.S. naval base in Cuba."

And yet...Justice Scalia....ever the cheerleader for unlimited executive powers, contrary to the Founders, once again, comes down on the wingnut fear-mongering, anti-American side.....writing in dissent....

“…it sets our military commanders the impossible task of proving to a civilian court, under whatever standards this Court devises in the future, that evidence supports the confinement of each and every enemy prisoner.
The Nation will live to regret what the Court has done today.”

John McCain, the GOP's candidate for president this November, has stated clearly and repeatedly that, should he be elected, he would nominate Supreme Court Justices in the mold of Samuel Alito and John Roberts.

Those voting yesterday against basic law and order, and historic Constitutional guarantees.....

Roberts, Alito, Scalia and Thomas.

The danger of a McCain presidency because of his advocacy for the lawless Bush doctrine of imperialistic wars of choice, is, in itself, just cause for rejecting the Straight Talker from taking over the White House. However, McCain's enthusiasm for Justices like Roberts and Alito, may even be a more pressing reason to reject the Arizona Senator.

The addition of Roberts and Alito have already produced the rotten domestic fruit of rejecting free speech in the "Bong Hits For Jesus" case, a 'standing of law on it's head' argument in rejecting affirmative action, and the Republican Party rescue effort in Indiana's voter ID, voter suppression law. Their dissent over something as fundamental as habeas corpus demonstrates the national danger of adding yet another extremist Justice.....almost certain to happen if McCain, perish the thought, becomes president.

Of Note: Brokeback Beacon....never one to quit the radical Bush presidency....decided to use the headline: "Civilian Courts Take Over", to describe the Supreme Court's re-affirmation of settled post-Enlightenment law and American history.